Secrets of a Proper Countess

by Lecia Cornwall

  “Where is he?” Isobel demanded again, unable to think or say anything else. She cocked the trigger and took aim at the place Honoria’s heart would be, if she’d had one.

  Honoria got up and walked toward Isobel, her eyes cold. She plucked the gun out of her hand. “Calm yourself. I’m certainly not going to answer your questions while you’re threatening me. Robin is fine. It was a long trip, and he’s fast asleep upstairs. Charles promised to take him to the beach later if the weather is pleasant.” She crossed the room and set the pistol on the tea table, well out of reach.

  “To the beach?” Isobel echoed, fear blooming in her chest. “Like Mr. Hart?”

  Honoria’s broad face flushed scarlet. “What are you talking about? May I remind you that I am the child’s guardian? You made yourself unfit to be his mother, not I. Is Blackwood with you, by the way?” She made a great show of looking past Isobel at the empty doorway. “I see he is not. A moment’s pleasure—or perhaps it was a jest—and he’s gone on to his next conquest.” Isobel felt her skin heat, but she held her mother-in-law’s eyes, refusing to feel ashamed.

  “Lady Honoria, I must insist—” Marianne began sharply, but Honoria turned on her.

  “This is a family concern, Countess, and no business of yours.”

  “If you intend to harm an innocent child, then it is most certainly my concern,” Marianne said fiercely. “I understand there have been threats—”

  “Threats?” Honoria warbled. “Against my beloved grandson? What tales have you been telling, Isobel?” She turned back to Marianne. “Isobel has disgraced herself, and I am within my rights to remove my grandson from her influence. There has obviously been a misunderstanding. Isobel, did you not beg me to allow Robin to spend a few weeks by the sea?”

  “Yes, but not like this,” Isobel began, but Honoria waved an imperious hand. Out of long habit, Isobel fell silent at once.

  “You see, Countess Westlake? I’m afraid Isobel is given to flights of fancy, just like her mother.” Her eyes bored into Isobel’s, the message clear. Whore.

  Isobel cast a sidelong glance at Marianne, saw the doubt on her face. Anger rose, made her bold. Honoria had far blacker sins on her soul than she did. “I want to see Robin at once.”

  For a moment it appeared Honoria would refuse, but Isobel held her mother-in-law’s gaze. For once Honoria looked away first, lowering her eyes to stare at the ruby ring on her hand before she shrugged and crossed to the door.

  “Obviously, you won’t be satisfied until you see for yourself that the boy is safe.” She sighed, and looked at Marianne, an ugly parody of concern on her face. “I hate to wake him so early after such a long journey. Children need their sleep, but I suppose it can’t be helped.”

  Marianne stepped aside to let Honoria lead the way out of the room. Her skirts left a trail on the dusty floor, and Isobel followed in her wake.

  Honoria led the way upstairs, down familiar hallways. “You remember this room, don’t you, Isobel?” she asked, pausing before a set of double doors. “It was your mother’s chamber, I believe.”

  Isobel rushed past her and opened the doors.

  “Robin?” The room was dark and shuttered. Marianne followed her. “Robbie?” The bed was empty, the furniture draped in Holland cloth, gray with dust. Robin wasn’t here. The only creatures here were ghosts.

  Isobel spun, but it was too late.

  The door slammed behind them and the key scraped in the lock.

  Chapter 46

  Charles leapt to his feet in surprise as the door to the study burst open, knocking over the tumbler of brandy he was enjoying as a late breakfast.

  Philip Renshaw, damn him, didn’t even flinch. He merely glanced at Honoria as she invaded the room and tossed Charles a lace-edged handkerchief to mop the brandy off his breeches.

  “Gentlemen, there’s a problem.”

  “What’s the matter, Lady Honoria?” Philip asked, his tone edged with annoyance.

  “Isobel is here.”

  “What?” Charles gaped at his mother’s mottled face in disbelief. “She’s supposed to be dead in a ditch by now. How did she get here?”

  Honoria leveled him with a quelling look, as if it was his fault. “I assume Marianne Westlake brought her, since she is here as well. Isobel had a pistol, and she demanded to see the boy.”

  Charles felt Philip’s sharp eyes on him. “This wasn’t supposed to happen,” he said, trying to placate Philip.

  “We cannot afford mistakes,” Philip said flatly.

  “What do you propose we do, Mother? King Louis will be here in a few hours!”

  “Do not call the traitor ‘king,’ if you please,” Philip said. “The French have no king. We have an emperor.” He fingered the diamond pin in his cravat, an N for Napoleon, but his eyes remained cold, boring into Charles’s as he drew the same manicured finger across his throat. “Kill the women along with the child.”

  Charles felt nauseous. Once, they’d been friends, but Philip had ceased to be amusing. His quest for revenge now made him frightening. Knocking a man on the head and pushing him into the sea was one thing. Cutting a woman’s throat, a child’s?

  “Impossible!” Honoria declared. “Lady Marianne is the granddaughter of a duke, the wife of an earl. We cannot just dispose of her and have it remain unnoticed.”

  Charles cringed inwardly as Philip turned to her. She wore that hateful, haughty expression he loathed. He half wished Philip would do him a favor and use the sharp little knife he’d been using to pare his fingernails and cut his mother’s throat.

  Instead, Philip smiled. “You lack imagination, Honoria.” He waved his hand, and a diamond ring flashed in the sun straggling through the dirty windows. “We will simply arrange a carriage accident or some such misadventure.”

  “But there will be questions! What if Westlake comes here?”

  “Or Blackwood,” Charles muttered.

  “Blackwood!” Honoria spat. “What has that fool to do with anything?”

  “Marianne is his sister, Mother, and we know what he is to Isobel. What if Marianne told someone else about her journey? The woman never stops talking,” Charles added imprudently, and could have bitten his tongue in two. Philip’s eyes flicked over him like a serpent’s tongue.

  “Ah, Blackwood. Even in Paris they talk about him. I feared leaving my wife in London, but I assume Evelyn’s virtue is quite safe if Isobel is his mistress.”

  “She is not!” Honoria said. “What would a man like Blackwood want with a dowd like her? Jane told me she saw them together, but I don’t believe a word of it. I merely went along with the story as a convenient excuse to be rid of Isobel at last.”

  “In my experience, it is the quietest ladies who are the most daring. Are you sure Isobel knows nothing of our activities here? Something she might share with a friend…” Philip raised his brows and looked at Honoria. “…or a lover?”

  Charles watched his mother’s face pale. Had they underestimated Isobel? She wasn’t as stupid as Mother liked to think, and she could very well have seen or heard something. She might even have told Marianne, or Evelyn or Lady Augusta. And if gossip fell on the wrong ears—Charles swallowed.

  “But discovery would mean treason and disgrace and death!” Honoria gasped. “Charles? Have you said anything in front of Isobel, or Jane? You know how you get when you drink—”

  “Of course not!” Charles snapped. Guilt prodded him to confess, but he clamped his jaw shut. He could hardly tell them now that he had been using Waterfield to bring in contraband, when he was supposed to be securing the place for this single purpose, could he? He’d needed the coin, and it had been a small thing to use the cove below the abbey. What harm could it have done? He mentally counted the men from here to London who knew him, could point him out as a smuggler, and his stomach churned.

  “What if we were followed from the Bosun’s Belle, or the innkeeper survived?” Honoria cried, wringing her hands. “The authorities could be on their way
here even now. We can’t go through with this. We must leave for France at once, while there’s still time!” Her vast bosom shook as she gulped lungfuls of air and her eyes bulged. “Charles?”

  He stared at his mother. It was the first time she had asked his advice instead of giving him orders. He had none to offer. Her terror made his own spine melt.

  Philip took her arm and forced her into the nearest chair. “Sit, my lady, before you swoon. It is too late to change our plans, and you are being well paid for the risks you are taking. You will deal with the ladies, and the boy, and in a few days you will be taking coffee with the emperor in Paris.”

  Honoria’s only reply was a whimper of fear. She was sweating and there were ugly stains on her expensive gown.

  Philip’s face twisted with disgust. He crossed to pour a tumbler of brandy, and pressed it into her hand. “Calm yourself, madam,” he commanded.

  “Yes, Mother. The French king—er, the former Duc d’Orleans—is already on his way here.” He watched his mother sip the brandy, and his own mouth watered. Damn her. She’d ordered him not to drink, to keep a clear head. She set the glass down, barely touched. He licked his lips.

  Philip’s glare was vulpine and dangerous. “Charles is right. We must see to the final preparations. It will give us something to do. I assume your ‘guests’ are safely locked in somewhere?”

  “Upstairs,” Honoria croaked. She was trembling, a great shivering blancmange. Charles hated her.

  Philip nodded. “Good. Then I suggest you leave everything else to me, so this mission is completed to the emperor’s satisfaction. Now, I need a meal. Are there any servants in this place?”

  Honoria nodded. “A cook and a maid, as you ordered. No others.” Charles noted that she kept her head bowed humbly, cowed at last.

  “Excellent. Our transport has been arranged, and there isn’t much time.”

  Honoria got up slowly. “I will go and see to your meal.”

  “My lady?” Philip called, stopping her. She turned, her flaccid face grim.

  Charles felt a twinge of fear as Philip crossed to his mother and put a finger under her uppermost chin, tipping her head up, forcing her to meet his eyes. Honoria’s eyes widened, mesmerized by his reptilian glare. “Don’t try to flee. Any more mistakes will come with a heavy price, which you will personally pay. Is that clear?” He drew his finger gently under her flesh, from one ear to the other, his meaning plain.

  Honoria leapt back, clasping a hand to her throat. Charles swallowed reflexively.

  “I am in charge now,” Philip whispered.

  Charles felt sick as his mother’s eyes jerked toward his, pleading, but he had no pity for her. He grabbed the glass of brandy she’d left and swallowed it.

  Chapter 47

  Isobel tugged at the window shutters, ignoring the cloud of dust that filled Charlotte’s bedchamber as she wrestled with the warped wood, but the salt-rusted hinges stuck fast.

  Marianne gave up trying to force the lock on the door and turned. “Surely you aren’t going to try to climb out this window, Isobel. We’re in a tower!”

  “I will if I have to,” Isobel said, her teeth gritted in determination.

  “But that’s—” Marianne began, but Isobel stopped her with a fierce look.

  “I will find my son!” Her fingernail tore, bled, but she hardly noticed. “He’s still alive. He must be. I’d know if he were already—” She couldn’t say it. “Even Charles couldn’t do such a thing in broad daylight.”

  “Oh, Isobel,” Marianne said, her eyes sympathetic.

  Isobel turned back to the shutters. How long had it been since they were opened? It was fifteen years since her mother was last here.

  Marianne added her strength and the ancient latches relented at last, swinging open with a squeal of protest.

  “No!”

  There was no window, only a narrow medieval slit in the abbey’s thick stone wall, cross-shaped, designed to keep marauders out and nuns in. The morning sun emblazoned the crucifix on the stone floor, and the wind slipped through the crack, whistling a mocking tune as it stirred the dust.

  Isobel put her eye to the narrow gap and peered out. Beyond the cliff the sea sparkled, and she could smell the fragrance of roses in the garden. On the right, the park stretched wide and empty toward the unseen road, more than a mile away. She clenched her fists against the whitewashed stone, but it remained solid and unmerciful, even in the face of a mother’s distress.

  “There has to be another way out,” she muttered as she turned to prowl the edges of the room. Old abbeys always had secret doors and hidden passageways, didn’t they? Or was that just in novels? She pressed her cheek to the wall and peered behind the armoire. Nothing.

  “We’ll have to wait,” Marianne said.

  “For what?”

  “For Adam. And Phineas as well, of course.”

  “Marianne, they don’t even know we’re here!”

  Marianne smiled. “Between the pair of them, I have every confidence that they’ll find us, especially if we give them a little help.” She crossed to the wardrobe and opened it.

  Her reflection moved like a ghost in the dusty mirrored doors. “There must be something in here we could use to speed up our rescue. It’s nearly time for luncheon, and I’m hungry. Oh, Isobel, look at these!”

  She pulled the dust covers off the garments still hanging in the wardrobe and ran her hand over the shimmering gowns.

  Charlotte’s gowns.

  Isobel felt her chest tighten.

  Marianne pulled one out and hung it over the door, standing back to admire it with feminine delight. Isobel brushed her knuckles over the pale blue silk. Silver lace shimmered on the sleeves, and the bodice was a low-cut scandal.

  It reminded her of the pink gown she’d worn to Marianne’s masquerade, of Blackwood’s arms around her, of his hands on her skin, his mouth—She turned away from the dress, and the wave of longing.

  “Petticoats!” Marianne gushed. “Just what we need.” She stood on tiptoe to reach the bundle on the top shelf. “My husband will be shocked, and that will bring him running all the faster.” She giggled wickedly as she tugged at the ribbons that held the muslin bag closed.

  They cascaded over her, a tidal wave of lace and silk and satin, splashing across the floor, flooding the room.

  A painted wooden box fell off the shelf as well, and broke open with a crash, disgorging a cargo of yellowed letters. The musical works began to play a rusty, hesitant rendition of an old minuet.

  Marianne chose a violet petticoat trimmed with pink roses. She carried it over and tied the ribbons to the hinges of the shutter before pushing the frothy lace out through the cross-shaped opening. They watched it flutter in the wind, shocking against the gray stone of the abbey, an absurd flag announcing that the countesses of Ashdown and Westlake were in residence at Waterfield Abbey.

  Isobel glanced at the spilled letters and dismissed them. Most were addressed to her uncle in a feminine hand that slanted over thick vellum. They wouldn’t help her escape this room or find Robin. She searched the cobwebbed ceiling above her. Thick wooden beams supported solid stone. The floor had no loose boards or trapdoors to aid her. The room felt like a crypt.

  Marianne scooped the letters off the stone floor. “Look, here’s one addressed to you, Isobel.”

  “My uncle never wrote to me,” Isobel said impatiently. “Perhaps we could pry the hinges off the door,” she mused, though they were thick slabs of ancient iron.

  “We haven’t any tools,” Marianne murmured, and opened the letter herself. “There’s no way out, so we’ll have to content ourselves to wait until Adam finds a way in. At least we have something to read.”

  “I can’t just wait,” Isobel said, and crossed to check the wardrobe again, searching the drawers for hairpins or needles, or something useful that could knock holes in solid stone walls.

  But there was nothing but dust, and scraps of lace, and a brush and mirror.

&
nbsp; She hefted the heavy silver-backed brush. It might make a suitable weapon if Honoria returned. She bit her lip. If Honoria hadn’t been afraid of a pistol, a hairbrush wasn’t likely to stop her.

  Panic rose. She had to get to Robin. She glanced at Marianne, sitting on the floor, oblivious to the dust, reading the letters. Marianne had a child too. Was she so confident that her husband would rescue her? Of course she was. Westlake loved her.

  She shut her eyes and thought of Blackwood.

  He’d proposed, hadn’t he? Surely that meant he had some regard for her. If her note had reached him, would he have come to her rescue? She looked out the window slit, past the fluttering petticoat and across the empty park. Would he come for her now? Hope pushed at the dark edges of despair.

  “Come and sit down, Isobel,” Marianne coaxed. “Honoria will have to send someone to feed us. We can escape then.” She held out a letter. “You really should read this.”

  Isobel took the letter, keeping one eye on the door, her ears pricked for the sound of footsteps or the rattle of keys, the hairbrush at the ready by her side.

  Her eyes widened at what she read. Protestations of love and longing leapt at her from the page amid tearstains and the brown spots of age and mildew. She sank to her knees, finished the first letter and picked up another, then another.

  Dear brother, I beg you to find a way to send my child to me…How I miss my dearest Isobel…Tell me my daughter is well…Does Isobel remember me at all? She does not write to me, though I have written to her every day…You tell me you have been unable to get my letters to her, surely there is a way…Now she is old enough, send her to me in Florence…How did Fraser find out I had sent a man to fetch Isobel? Now she is married, and it is too late…

  Isobel was hardly aware she was crying until Marianne pressed a handkerchief into her hand.

  Her mother hadn’t abandoned her. She had wanted her to come to her, tried to enlist her uncle’s help. Had Lord Denby been too afraid, or too uncaring, to do anything but save her letters and leave them here in hopes that she would find them someday?